Kullo nafsin zaikatul maut
(Every
living being has to taste mortality)
The blues of Patna (Patna Blues by Abdullah Khan, Juggernaut
2018) come in various shades. Some are confessional, some on the verge of
morbidity and some are tainted with clichés. The book takes one through a city
in the grasp of a time which was very different from today. The time where 15
minutes of internet cost twenty rupees, and twenty rupees was a week’s travel
for a middle-class Patna boy. Class becomes one of the focal points of the book
and influences the protagonist’s every decision. The close nexus of class,
caste and religion governs almost every Indian’s behaviour and Arif’s family is
no stranger to this. The marriages are obstructed if the boy’s mother isn’t a
Pathan but not if he’s asking for heavy dowry. All problems are infused within
the everyday life. This is the most absorbing element of the book for many have
covered the lives of the middle-class strata, but most usually take refuge in
either showering pity or romanticising the problems, giving an otherworldliness
to this common world.
The lives of a Bihar police
officer, an IAS aspirant and a budding actor are complimented by the side roles
of daughters, mothers and grandmothers who are secondary opinion makers. All the
blessings that they earn are on account of their compliance. Even their biggest
problems are normalised to the extent that greedy in-laws and halted studies
are reduced to inevitable realities of these characters.
There are many stereotypes within
the narrative of the book which rear their head especially through the
protagonist’s opinions on women. They’re easily branded as shameless and
whorish and evaluated on lines of their physicality. Arif’s love for a married
lady starts off with cliched notions of long tresses, dimpled smiles and kohl
filled eyes. But, through the long periods of longings and reunions, he comes to
realise the practicality that his love lacks. It’s a passionate love which
keeps both of them hanging. “Nobody does a cost-benefit analysis before falling
in love.”, he tells himself early on. Yet the revaluation is inevitable towards
the end as he realises that matters of heart cannot be governed by the heart
alone.
While their love runs along the
lines of Bollywood sequences, the conflict between desire and duty is portrayed
accurately at various points. There’s a continuous struggle to not surrender to
‘Nafs-e-Ammarah.’ Their belonging to different religions entails conflicts
which portray the religious division that lied, and continues to lie, at the
heart of Indians. This aspect is quite elaborated by depicting small instances
of communal disharmony to organised violent riots.
Another major narrative within
the novel is of the protagonist’s brother who disappears during the police
arrests that occur after a chain of bomb blasts in Delhi. This marks the common
account of many Muslim youth in India – who are branded terrorists, become
victims of fake encounters and long battles in court. The helplessness of the
father son duo in the city, which loses their own flesh and blood, is bound to
fill one with intense empathy. The grief and pain that engulfs the entire
household is shown in all its incomprehensibility.
The book is a sincere account of
the human condition. The frailty of human life which is stuck in a limbo as it
loses a loved one in the most unexpected ways. Arif can’t help but witness his
father struggle to make ends meet and try to survive within a structure where
rearing dreams of a respectable career comes at the cost of being branded as an
idler. The anxiety that marks Arif’s existence through the continuous failed
attempts at becoming an IAS officer and seeing himself as a failed son and
brother is portrayed with an intense clarity. For this Patna boy, even ending
his own life is a privilege.
Patna Blues depicts human condition as it exists in contemporary
North India. The India where streets were deserted to watch an over of Azhar vs
McGrath. Where protests and processions put everyday lives on halt. Where bribes
and recommendations are the basis of jobs. And where a young man’s idealism and
high morals lose to the harsh realities of tragic yet common experiences.
- Asna Jamal Visit our site
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